Memoirs of Napoleon — Volume 13 by Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
page 30 of 86 (34%)
page 30 of 86 (34%)
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Commisairiers of the Allied powers."--Ah! that is well! I should like
to hang the villain with my own hands. "Ah! if you knew, sir, how the scoundrel has deceived us! It was I who received him on his return from Egypt. We wished to take his horses out and draw his carriage. I should like to avenge myself now for the honours I rendered him at that time." The crowd augmented, and continued to vociferate with a degree of fury which may be imagined by those who have heard the inhabitants of the south manifest, by cries, their joy or their hatred. Some more violent than the rest wished to force Napoleon's coachman to cry "Vive le Roi!" He courageously refused, though threatened with a stroke of a sabre, when, fortunately; the carriage being ready to start, he whipped the horses and set off at full gallop. The Commissioners would not breakfast at Orgon; they paid for what had been prepared, and took some refreshments away with them. The carriages did not overtake the Emperor until they came to La Calade, where he had arrived a quarter of an hour before with Amaudru. They found him standing by the fire in the kitchen of the inn talking with the landlady. She had asked him whether the tyrant was soon to pass that way? "Ah! sir," said she, "it is all nonsense to say we have got rid of him. I always, have said, and always will say, that we shall never be sure of being done with him until he be laid at the bottom of a well, covered over with stones. I wish we had him safe in the well in our yard. You see, sir, the Directory sent him to Egypt to get rid of him; but he came back again! And he will come back again, you maybe sure of that, sir; unless--" Here the good woman, having finished skimming her pot, looked up and perceived that all the party were standing uncovered |
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